


Congruence

by AirgiodSLV



Category: Bandom
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-03
Updated: 2010-06-03
Packaged: 2017-10-19 02:15:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/195738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AirgiodSLV/pseuds/AirgiodSLV
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>They’ve made it this far. If they were going to fall apart, they would have done it already.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Congruence

**Author's Note:**

> For the [Alternate Lineups](http://romanticalgirl.livejournal.com/855705.html) challenge, #75. Thanks to [](http://cupiscent.livejournal.com/profile)[**cupiscent**](http://cupiscent.livejournal.com/) for reading and reassuring, [](http://romanticalgirl.livejournal.com/profile)[**romanticalgirl**](http://romanticalgirl.livejournal.com/) for running the challenge and being so understanding, and [](http://disarm-d.livejournal.com/profile)[**disarm_d**](http://disarm-d.livejournal.com/) for sitting me down and making me write.

Mikey gets a text after the press conference goes live. The message says, _Good choice. I would have taken the conch shell as well_ , and the caller ID says _Bill Beckett_.

He tucks his phone in toward his chest a little even though none of the other guys are paying attention to him right now, and sends back, _congrats first one to get it_.

The next text says, _Not Pete?_

Mikey types, _he hasn’t seen it yet_ , because he’s sure Pete would have dropped him a text or an e-mail if he had. It’s still early, though, and Pete’s as much of a night owl right now as Mikey would be, if he weren’t promoting an album.

He doesn’t get another text after that, but he’s not really surprised. He can count on one hand the number of times he’s heard from Bill Beckett, and it probably takes some nerve, he thinks, actually texting one of the cool kids in a band their size. Then again, Bill says ‘Pete’ like he’s not name dropping, so he thinks maybe Bill has some experience brushing elbows with rock stars.

Gee wanders by and says, “Mikey, hey, we’re going to Japan soon. What would you take to Japan? Manga?”

“A katana,” Ray suggests, looking up from his laptop screen.

Frank’s eyes light up and Mikey thinks he’s going to jump on the katana bandwagon, but instead he says, “No way, man, fucking anime porn, like, tentacle rape, that shit is _insane_ ,” and Gee makes a noise like he’s either going to start lecturing on art or feminism, so Mikey automatically tunes them out.

Then Bob says, “Fuck that, who’s bringing sushi? I’m hungry,” and the conversation turns to lunch. Mikey tucks his phone into his pocket and forgets about the whole thing.

-

“Saw the conference,” Gabe says when he calls that night. Mikey sighs inwardly because he’s half-expecting Gabe to give him shit for it, too, but one thing Gabe has failed completely to be in all the time Mikey’s known him is predictable. He can’t stand not being in on the joke, though, so maybe it’s not such a surprise that he asks Mikey what the deal was with the conch shell.

Mikey explains the book, the reference, the symbolism and representation of civilized society. Gabe argues a few points with him as he goes, because he’s not one to let never having read the original source material stand in his way, but mostly he just asks Mikey to explain things until he has a handle on the whole deal.

“Maybe I’ll check it out,” he says finally, and Gabe’s surprisingly well-read for someone in their scene, so Mikey doesn’t doubt it. “I’ll bet Pete got it, right?”

Mikey stifles a small smile. “No,” he says. “Bill Beckett did, though. Actually.”

“Ha,” Gabe says, like that answer doesn’t surprise him in the least. “Your brother still giving you shit about it, or did you explain it to him?”

“Not yet,” Mikey says.

“Waiting until he’s really made an asshole of himself before the great reveal,” Gabe says wisely. “I know that trick.”

“Nah,” Mikey says, although it is funny, imagining it, and the look on Gee’s face when he finds out Mikey was actually being the smart one. He doesn’t need that, though. Gee had been flushed and honking with laughter earlier, elbowing and teasing him like the obnoxious older brother he is, and it makes Mikey happy to see him like that. They’ve all been working at getting back to normal, after Paramour. He can take a little ribbing.

“So what are you doing tomorrow?” Gabe asks. Mikey takes the out and changes the subject.

-

Mikey doesn’t remember the first time he met Bill Beckett. It was before Warped, probably at one of the tour stops in Jersey when they’d been opening for Midtown. Mikey had been to all of those shows that he could make, with the new album happening and all of them going into the studio to record. Maybe it had even been before that, at one of the Eyeball parties, or at one of the SoCo shows he’d caught when all the shit was going down with the label they were on with Gabe.

He has a vague recollection of a skinny kid in a truly horrifically fugly sweater, with hair falling in loopy curls around his eyes and a red plastic cup in his hand, but that could be a memory or it could be a picture he’d seen, or even a conglomeration of separate events. Mikey had undoubtedly met him, registered the sweater and the hair and the acoustic guitar he used to carry around, the hippie one with the flowers on it, and written him off as ‘not in our scene.’

He does remember the first time he met Gabe. He’d barely been buzzed and Gabe hadn’t been much farther along, but he’d caught Mikey’s wrist out on the dance floor and said, “Who’s playing this shit, and do you have an in with the DJ?” and ten minutes later they’d been spinning vinyl and arguing over who could be considered the kings of hair metal.

Mikey hadn’t gone home with him that night, but three parties later he’d dirty-danced with Gabe in the middle of a crowd, letting himself be moved while Gabe demonstrated salsa with the freewheeling coordination of the totally plastered. Gee had looked caught between horrified, concerned and a constipated attempt at supportive, which was reason enough for Mikey to let Gabe dip him at the end and plant a joking kiss on him when they shoved their way to the bar for last call.

A few months after that, Mikey had learned firsthand what else Gabe could do with his hips, and neither of them had really ever looked back.

He doesn’t know why it works. He’d never looked at Gabe and thought, ‘this is what’s missing in my life,’ but two years later, here they are. Gee knows about them – it would have been impossible to hide it from the band, especially for this long – and his attitude seems to be a mix of respect for Mikey’s choice and the steadfast belief that no one could ever be good enough. There are worse reactions; Mikey’s willing to take it.

It’s nice, though, that while Gabe and Gee get along fine, they’ve never been close. Gabe is something that Mikey didn’t have to steal, because Gee never had him first.

-

 _where r u?_ Gabe texts him, right as Mikey’s flight calls for boarding, so he shoulders his bag and falls into line behind the others as he types out _boarding_.

Gabe calls a bare second later, so Mikey tucks his phone under his chin and ignores the eyebrow-pucker questioning look Gee’s giving him and says, “Hey. We’re about to board.”

“I know, I thought I’d catch you before you went into the silent zone. You have some free time next weekend? I heard a rumour you have a day off.”

“We do.” He has to think through the schedule a day at a time, but he finally comes up with the date in question. “I booked my flight a day ahead of everyone else. The Academy guys are playing the day before us, I thought I’d hang with them and catch the show.”

“You’re scorning me for Bill?” Gabe sounds wounded, but Mikey knows nine-tenths of that is an act, so he ignores it. There is some honest disappointment in there when he says, “I thought you might be able to come out for a day, I was hoping we could meet up.”

“Next time,” Mikey says, and makes himself say it like a promise. “I’d barely get to see you anyway.”

Bob moves smoothly in between him and Gee to save Mikey an elbow to the side, but he does give Mikey a look that says it’s time to go. Mikey interrupts Gabe’s monologue about his heartbreaking ways to say, “We’ve got a thing when we get in, but I’ll call you tonight.”

“You’d better,” Gabe says. “ _Adios,_ Mikeyway.”

“Bye,” Mikey says.

“Boarding pass?” the girl behind the counter requests. He snaps his phone shut and hands it over.

-

Mikey’s always been social – Gee calls him a scene king – so his day ends up packed full, watching sets and visiting when anyone has ten minutes to spare. Bill catches him near the middle of the day for lunch, introducing him to Pete’s latest child prodigies on their way to find pizza. They all seem a little odd, suspicious of him and whispering amongst themselves, but Bill assures him it’s probably a symptom of being star-struck. He eventually also relents and admits that they are all pretty weird.

“They’re young,” he says, like he has more than a year or two on any of them. Mikey lets it pass, and allows Bill to pick off all his pepperoni and put it on Mikey’s slice.

He doesn’t catch the Academy guys again until the end of the day, when the sun has set and they’re all camping out in buses and lawn chairs. Mikey and Bill end up tucked into the back lounge, with the door closed between them and the incredibly loud game of no-hands, heads-only mini-basketball happening up front. Bill’s guitar is in his lap and he has his head bent over it, clearly concentrating when he strums a brief chord progression.

He looks up a second later at Mikey, caught out. “I’m not very good yet,” he confesses. “I don’t think I make the best guitar-playing frontman.”

Mikey shrugs equably. “I play bass,” he says. “I think we can get away with more.”

Bill sighs. “That’s what Pete says.” He strums a few more chords. There are no missteps, but Mikey can tell how focused he is on playing, where Ray could be writing a new song, having an argument about the best WoW character base, and fending off Frank kicking him in the ankle all at once without missing a beat.

Bill’s cell goes off, and he looks curious for a moment before he reads the caller ID and his expression breaks instantly into a soft smile. “Sorry,” he tells Mikey, and when Mikey just shrugs, he holds it to his ear and says, “Hey.”

It’s not exactly a wistful, helplessly in love tone of voice, but it’s warm and familiar enough that Mikey’s own personal guessing game has the best odds for ‘lover’ over ‘friend’ or ‘family member.’ Bill laughs, and then he says, “Mikey Way. Yeah,” and Mikey zones back in. Bill’s eyes flick to him and hold, a smile still playing around his mouth when he says, “Sure, I’ll ask.”

Bill covers the phone with his hand, lifting his chin to say, “It’s Gabe. Saporta. He wants to say hi.”

Mikey blinks, then holds out his hand. Bill passes over the phone and Mikey says, “Hey.”

“Hey,” Gabe says. “I just want you to know how hard it is for me not to start talking dirty right now, because you’ve abandoned me for younger, prettier frontmen and all I have for company is my right hand.”

Mikey mentally rolls his eyes and hopes that Gabe can read it over the phone. “Really?” he says, in place of _You’re an asshole_ , because Bill is still watching and listening curiously, and because he hasn’t seen Gabe in more than a month and he thinks it might come out suspiciously fond.

“I wouldn’t want you to get spunk on Bill’s phone,” Gabe points out. “Once I get started, you wouldn’t be able to stop.”

“You’re an asshole,” Mikey says, because he can only hold out on the impulse for so long.

Gabe’s laughter brays in his ear and he can’t help the very tiny smile, although he hopes it’s not soft enough for Bill to see. “I’ll call you tonight, we’ll do this the right way. You’re staying up late?”

“Probably,” Mikey says. He’s in the middle of a music festival. It seems likely.

“ _Te quiero_ ,” Gabe says. “ _Adios_.”

“Bye,” Mikey says, and hands the phone back to Bill.

Bill looks curious, but Mikey’s learned by now that Bill looks curious about everything, and this doesn’t seem above and beyond the usual. He tilts his head and says, “How many bands do you know of that have bass-playing frontmen?” and they pick up right where they left off.

-

The Black Parade tour is exhausting, and even when they get a second wind, extending it takes a toll. Cobra Starship is picking up steam, so even when Mikey has a second to spare, Gabe usually doesn’t.

Gee spends a lot of time being careful with him, and Mikey appreciates it even though it’s for all the wrong reasons. He knows Gee thinks that being apart might be cracking their relationship. Everyone knows long-distance is hard, and Mikey’s not an exception. But even with the stress of two bands, he feels more secure than ever. They’ve made it this far. If they were going to fall apart, they would have done it already.

He suspects part of Gee also _hopes_ they fall apart, but it’s not because he wants Mikey to be unhappy, so Mikey forgives him for it. Gee just believes in finding a soulmate and settling down and having a house with a white picket fence, and while Mikey doesn’t think he’d have any problem with the kids being adopted and the marriage only legal in certain states, Gabe’s just not the girl-next-door type.

Frank is, bizarrely, more vocally supportive, and even asks how Gabe’s doing almost every day as if he really means it. Then again, Mikey supposes, Frank’s also dealing with the same thing with Jamia. He gets it.

The second their plane touches down in Jersey, he’s sending a text. _Come see me_ , he types, and doesn’t really give a fuck if anyone sees to tease him about it.

 _Off the bus and into your arms_ , Gabe sends. It helps. It’s not enough, yet, but it helps.

Enough comes later, when Gabe leans on the buzzer to Mikey’s apartment building and they end up jerking each other off messily right inside the front door because navigating to the bedroom would take too long and require them to stop kissing for an unacceptable length of time. Gabe draws the line at collapsing on the rug, though; he drags Mikey down the hall because, “I’m too fucking old for sleeping on the floor, Mikeyway, and I’m dead on my feet.”

They’re both rank, the stench of tour permeating their clothes and their skin, but when Mikey gives a half-longing look at the stupidly froofy bath salts, Gabe shakes his head and turns him back against the wall of the shower stall.

“We’ll fall asleep,” he murmurs, in between kisses with his hands already roaming again all over Mikey’s skin. “It’s not worth drowning.”

They make an honest attempt at getting each other off under the shower spray, but they’re both too tired to get it up again and the hot water doesn’t hold out for long enough. Bundled up under a comforter that smells like lavender laundry detergent instead of sweaty feet is a good alternative, though, and with Gabe’s arm thrown over his chest, Mikey is the most content he has been in months.

He tries to stay awake to enjoy the feeling, but falls asleep between that breath and the next.

-

They don’t have nearly long enough before they both have to hit the road again. Their time is spent evenly divided between having as much sex as possible, eating their weight in health food, and sleeping like the dead for twelve or more hours at a time. Mikey guesses this would be the point where Gee would ask him whether they have shared conversational interests and talk about their feelings, but they’ve talked enough over a phone line. This isn’t the time for talking.

Eventually they separate enough to be able to catch up on voicemails and unanswered messages, although Mikey ends up more often than not with his head in Gabe’s lap and Gabe’s fingers combing absently through his hair as they both tap away on their Sidekicks.

He finds two lines of a poem that give him a moment of pause, and after a moment’s deliberation he copies them into a new message. Normally he’d send it to Pete, but this isn’t Pete’s type of thing. He’d appreciate it as verse, but the message is too simple, the lines almost overwhelmingly sweet. Instead, Mikey types _Bill Beckett_ in the address bar and hits send.

Gabe cranes over slightly to see, his fingers sliding sideways in Mikey’s hair. “Poetry?” he asks. “Do you send him flowers, too?”

Mikey knows he’s joking, because Gabe isn’t petty enough to play off jealousy when he really means it (if nothing else, Pete Wentz had taught them both that), but the question still makes something in him twist. He pushes himself up onto one elbow and kisses Gabe, pressing his fingertips into the warm skin at the nape of Gabe’s neck. “You want to read it?” he asks.

Gabe smiles crookedly down at him. “I did, while you were deciding whether to send it,” he says. “It’s good. He’ll appreciate it. That why you didn’t send it to Pete?”

Mikey shrugs one shoulder. “Pete wouldn’t be changed by it,” he says. “Or inspired.”

“Yeah.” Gabe keeps looking at him, in and through the way no one else ever does, and finally says lightly, “You know I kissed him once?”

Mikey relaxes slightly, because if Gabe’s talking about Bill like that, they’re not even skirting an issue. “I’m shocked,” he says, monotone. Gabe grins and tips his chin up, kissing Mikey like he’s saying, _But not like this. No one else gets this_ , and Mikey lets him do it even though he already knows. It’s not an unpleasant reminder.

“He’s pretty good,” Gabe says conversationally, and Mikey rolls his eyes this time, because he knows this ploy and Gabe’s utterly transparent when he’s after something.

“I’m not going to get jealous,” he says.

Gabe’s smile curves wider. “I know,” he says, and leans in for another kiss.

-

Summer tours always pass in a blur somewhere between too-fast and never-ending. Gabe and Pete are on tour together again, which means a rapid descent into best-friend madness that involves a lot of crazy stunts, inevitably building up to some sort of international diplomatic incident.

“Pete’s been listening to Patrick’s anger management books on tape, and I haven’t pissed in an alley in months. We’re practically reformed men,” Gabe claims, when Mikey tells him this. “Besides, we have Bill around to keep us in line.”

“That’s reassuring,” Mikey says dubiously. He’s seen what Bill can get up to when he’s drunk, and Bill tends to be drunk – particularly when on tour with Gabe’s band – a high percentage of the time.

“You’d be surprised,” Gabe says. “I can’t even get him to shoplift. He talked Pete out of climbing down the rain gutter of our hotel in a towel two days ago, which was too bad, because that shit was going to be epic.”

“Send me pictures if he does it,” Mikey says immediately. He suspects Pete will beat Gabe to it and send them himself, but it never hurts to have copies.

“I see your brother’s at it again,” Gabe says, changing subjects with typical speed and dexterity. Mikey can usually follow him through most of the leaps of logic; luckily, this one isn’t that far. “Do I need to remind Gee of how he might have a prior claim, but I’ve got the bigger dick?”

Mikey already knows which show Gabe must have seen clips of, to mention that. “He leaves me alone, mostly,” he says, shrugging even though Gabe can’t see him. “I think it’s the heat.”

It’s the same every summer, or has been since Gee’s gotten sober. He and Frank suddenly develop this weird sexual tension where they don’t want each other, but need to somehow prove that they would be okay with wanting each other, to keep themselves from feeling like homophobic assholes. There’s a lot of resulting groping and sixth-grade flirting, and sometimes Mikey is a casualty caught in the crossfire.

It’s only especially weird because it’s his brother and his best friend, and because they have thousands of girls screaming for them every time they get close to each other. No one ever screams when Gabe touches Mikey, and they’re the ones actually fucking. He goes back and forth on whether he’s profoundly relieved by that or whether he’s annoyed by Gee yet again getting all of the attention.

“It’s Frank and Gee,” he says by way of explanation, because Gabe’s heard all of his theories on their annual gay-friendly freakouts. “They’ll get over it.”

“And they better knock that shit off soon,” Bob puts in from somewhere behind him, accompanied by the rustling of kitchen cupboards being opened and explored. “I never know how long I need to fill.”

“I’m fine with it,” Ray chimes in. “If they’re busy being all over each other, they’re not humping me.”

“Yo, I’m going to show them how to do this gay chicken shit,” Gabe says in Mikey’s ear, already dangerously warm with enthusiasm. “They can watch and learn from the master.”

“Please don’t get arrested,” Mikey requests, which he figures is about the best he can hope for.

“ _Mi amor,_ ” Gabe says in a wounded tone. “I told you, I’m a reformed man.”

“Right,” Mikey says.

The truth is, he wouldn’t want Gabe any other way.

-

 _chk bzznet_ , Gabe texts him a few days later, and Mikey almost doesn’t want to know. He looks anyway.

It’s nothing that’s going to get Gabe in serious trouble, and honestly he hasn’t even come close to Gee-and-Frank levels of onstage misconduct. Yet. It’s all innocent playacting, not even as racy as he sometimes gets dancing with Victoria.

The hitch is that he seems to have chosen Bill as his gay chicken partner – which admittedly doesn’t come as a huge shock – and Mikey isn’t totally sure how he feels about that.

It’s not that it bothers him. Their stage act is offering white roses and ordering each other onto their knees, all joking fun, and Mikey knows there’s nothing behind it. It’s the secret, sidelong smiles that give him pause, the way Bill’s face lights up with laughter whenever Gabe is onstage.

He doesn’t know how to ask _does he know you’re seeing someone?_ without sounding jealous, so in the end he just doesn’t. He does spend considerably more time on buzznet, looking up old pictures and videos. He finds a recent photo of Gabe with a paper tray between his teeth, hands forming a heart. There’s one of Bill to match, and Mikey clicks back and forth between them trying to read their expressions before giving it up as a lost cause. He’ll never be able to tell anything real about Gabe from a fan photo.

He flips open his phone and ponders sending a message. _I want an I ♥ Mikey photo_ , or _Frank did that one already, you’re late_ , or just _cute_.

His phone buzzes in his hand while he’s still debating what to do, and Gabe’s name pops up on the caller ID.

 _wish u were here_ , it says.

Mikey closes out his internet windows and writes back, _me 2_.

-

“We finished the album,” Gabe says when Mikey answers the phone.

He’d known they were close, with Gabe’s daily updates from the studio, but it’s still far earlier than expected. “What are you going to do now?” he asks.

“Go on tour,” Gabe says. Mikey can hear the shrug in his voice. “We need to start promoting, there’s not really anything else to do.”

“You don’t have a tour lined up for months,” Mikey reminds him, although he knows Gabe is already well aware of that fact.

“We’ll crash someone else’s,” Gabe says. “Bill said we could tag along on theirs. It would only be opening for a few weeks, but it’s better than nothing.”

“So I won’t see you next month,” Mikey infers. He’d been half-expecting something to happen, with how far ahead of schedule the new record had been, but it’s still a disappointment. It always is, when they miss each other like this.

“Come see us,” Gabe says. “You go to shows all the time. No one will think twice.”

“That’s when I’m already there. Eventually someone might wonder why I’m flying halfway across the country to see Cobra Starship,” Mikey points out.

He hears the click of a mouse and a few keyboard-tapping rhythms, and then Gabe says, “They’re playing Philly. It’s practically your backyard.”

“Okay,” Mikey says, and scratches his nose. He can look up the dates, see what they’re doing and when. It would be nice to take a break.

“I’m getting you a backstage pass,” Gabe says, still clicking away in the background. “Use it or I book you a flight to a show in Buttfuck, Nebraska. Try explaining that one to your fans.”

“I’ll tell them I’m a big fan of neon,” Mikey says.

“Fuck you,” Gabe says, cheerful. “Anyway, Bill’s there, and Armor, you’ll be golden. No argument. I’ll see you in a few weeks.”

-

Mikey catches the show and sticks around afterward, partying with the guys and sneaking off with Gabe once everyone’s too drunk to notice. He falls asleep on the couch in the Cobras’ lounge and wakes up in the same place, disoriented to find Bill leaning against the counter across the room.

Bill notices his waking and comes over when Mikey sits up, crouching down beside the couch. “They had a promotional thing,” he says softly, breaking the uncharacteristic silence on the bus. “I just came over to see if you were up and wanted to get breakfast. I brought coffee,” he adds, with a smile that’s almost shy.

Mikey rubs his eyes until he can see more than blurry outlines; takes the enormous cardboard cup from Bill’s hand and drinks half of it before pausing for breath. He’d express his gratitude, but getting the caffeine into his system is more important, and surely Bill knows that.

“Breakfast?” he says, when the coffee is gone. It had been warm, but not hot enough to burn his tongue, which means it doesn’t really count as the first cup of the morning. He could use another three. And maybe some bacon. When Gabe and Frank aren’t around he feels less guilty about devouring butchered pigs.

“There’s a diner down the road, we’re about to check it out,” Bill tells him. Mikey squints at the window and calculates the hour. Not early, not by any means; Bill looks too put-together, and the sun filtering into the bus is too strong, not the weak watery light of early morning.

“Sounds good,” Mikey says. “Will there be coffee?”

Bill grins, and Mikey blinks. His eyes haven’t adjusted yet to that level of brightness. “I’ll get you some more if there isn’t,” he promises, which is enough to tug Mikey the rest of the way off the couch, pushing his feet into his battered trainers.

“Okay,” Mikey says. “Lead on.”

-

Gabe catches him in a hallway somewhere in the venue and pulls him into the nearest bathroom. The Academy is setting up to soundcheck, Carden’s guitar riffs echoing through the empty hallways accompanied by the occasional abbreviated throb of Siska’s bass.

“We haven’t done this in a while,” Mikey comments, as Gabe herds him into the handicapped stall and locks the door.

“Fuck off, I haven’t seen you in forever and there’s fucking people everywhere, and you’re wearing these fucking jeans,” Gabe replies, some of it muffled by his concentration in getting Mikey’s belt and fly open.

Mikey arches his hips forward helpfully, bracing himself against the stall divider. “Yeah,” he says when Gabe pulls him out of his underwear and starts stroking, just a shade too tight the way both of them like it.

“Been fucking thinking about this all day,” Gabe says, hot against Mikey’s neck. His other hand has insinuated itself under Mikey’s t-shirt, spanning his side and the top of his hip. Mikey pushes into it to feel Gabe hold him back, his grip tightening just enough to make Mikey’s toes curl.

“Life sucks when you live on a bus,” Mikey says, only half-paying attention to the words coming out of his mouth. Gabe snorts and bites his neck, brief enough that it won’t leave a mark.

Gabe’s palm is rough and familiar and perfect, and Mikey has just started thrusting up into it, heedless of the strained creaking of the divider wall, when he hears the bathroom door swing open and they both freeze. Gabe’s hand claps over his mouth, like Mikey could even draw breath to make a sound, like it isn’t frozen dry and painful in his throat.

There’s the scuffling noise of shoes on the tiled floor, and the sound of water turning on and off again. A paper towel rips free of the dispenser, and in the echo of that Mikey hears the unmistakable sound of a sung scale, low to high, dying off at the peak. His breathing resumes in a stifled gulp, and Gabe’s palm presses harder against his mouth, his other hand still squeezing Mikey’s dick.

They both have to recognize the voice. No one else on the tour has Bill’s range, and they’ve both heard him doing vocal warm-ups before, in trailers and green rooms and backstage bathrooms just like this one. His shoes squeak again as he moves around, still running through scales, and Mikey feels sweat break out at his hairline. Every muscle in his body is coiled tight and tense. If he comes over here…if he sees their shoes…if he guesses what’s going on…

He can’t help shifting, rocking up into Gabe’s fist in tiny, controlled movements. Gabe exhales against the side of his face in what’s probably surprise, but his hand starts moving again, gliding over Mikey’s dick slow and tight. It still hurts to breathe, hurts to keep quiet, trying not to make a sound while his hips push up helplessly into Gabe’s hand.

His imagination is going into overdrive, picturing Bill suddenly stopping right outside the handicapped stall, the door swinging open, his face frozen in shock at seeing them like this, with Mikey exposed and aroused and Gabe all over him.

The vocal warm-ups break off suddenly, dying in a chorus of echoes, and then Mikey hears Bill sigh, soft and wistful.

Mikey bites down on Gabe’s fingers and comes all over his hand.

The bathroom door swings shut with a slow gust of air, and Gabe’s fingers pry loose from Mikey’s mouth. “Are we going to talk about what just happened?” Gabe asks, amusement in his voice mixing with something low and dark and heated.

“Later,” Mikey says, and drops to his knees.

-

Gabe thinks it’s hilarious, predictably, and gives Mikey shit for the next week via dirty text messages. Mikey thinks for a while that he’s safe playing it off as an unexpected exhibitionist kink, but Gabe knows him better than that.

He sends Mikey a link to youtube clip of Bill at a show, sweaty and panting in the crowd with his shirt hanging open and loose from his shoulders, hands all over him. Mikey snaps his phone shut before Gee – or worse, Frank – can see, and spends the next half-hour intensely focused on comic books to keep himself from jacking off in their cramped bathroom.

Gabe crashes their tour as soon as he has a few days of free time, and they drive ahead in a rental car to spend a night in the dubious privacy of a hotel room. Mikey sucks Gabe’s dick on the hideous floral-patterned bedspread, one of his hands on Gabe’s bent knee, foot braced against the mattress.

He can tell when Gabe starts thinking about someone else. His eyes close and his face changes, a wrinkle in his forehead between his eyebrows. Gabe gets off on watching what they’re doing almost as much as physically doing it, and his eyes are always glued to Mikey’s mouth, his dick, the joining of their bodies, usually with a running commentary on how hot it is to see him like this. Right now Gabe’s jaw is clenched, his breath exhaling in shallow pants through his nose.

Mikey calls him on it later, when Gabe’s unwound and they’re half-spooned together, damp and slightly chilled on top of the bedcovers. “Who were you thinking about?” he asks, and when Gabe stills, he adds honestly, “It doesn’t bother me.”

It doesn’t. They both fuck other people, when they’re apart, and neither of them begrudge the other a little fantasy playtime. It’s just that Gabe had been with someone else, for a few minutes there, and Mikey wants to know who it was.

Gabe rolls onto his side and props himself up on his elbow, dropping a kiss somewhere in the vicinity of Mikey’s temple. “You let me get away with too much stupid shit, Mikeyway,” he says, and this time the kiss lands on Mikey’s mouth, warm and wet.

Mikey kisses him back, lets Gabe stall for time or apologize or whatever it is that he’s doing. When Gabe finally breaks away and slides back down next to him, his arm draping heavy and solid over Mikey’s chest, he murmurs, “When I was done being a stupid asshole and opened my eyes, I was glad it was you there.”

Mikey turns his head and bumps his nose into Gabe’s, searching blindly for his mouth. He kisses Gabe slow and sweet and a little dirty, and doesn’t ask again. It doesn’t matter.

-

The winter holidays are a welcome respite for both of them. Mikey has to go home for Christmas and Gabe has Chanukah, but when they’re not with family they’re together, in threadbare sweatpants and faded band shirts watching cartoon holiday specials and pigging out on vegan chili.

Gabe’s the one to find the promo clip of Bill talking shit about him over New Year’s, about how being like Gabe means drinking more vodka and kissing more boys. “It’s like he knows you,” Mikey says, chin propped up on the crook of Gabe’s elbow to watch the laptop screen.

“Shut up,” Gabe says, closing the laptop and dropping it onto the floor beside the couch. “I only kiss one boy and mean it.”

They spend a while making out, Mikey savoring the way December means they never have to rush through things, the way they always feel like for this little while, they have time. Gabe has his hands under Mikey’s shirt and Mikey’s fingers are tangled in his hair, tugging every so often because it makes Gabe purr into Mikey’s open mouth.

They’re distracted by the jingle-bell intro of another Christmas special, and settle into watching with their hands still on each other’s skin. It’s the second commercial break before Gabe breaks the easy quiet to say, “You could hook up with him, if you wanted.”

Mikey’s mind has been on snowflakes and gift lists, so it takes him a second to catch up, and when he does, his response is still, “What?”

He thinks he knows who Gabe’s talking about. Gabe must think so, too, because all he says is, “It’s not like we’re exclusive.”

While that’s technically true, this is different for a million different reasons, not the least of which is that they’re talking about a friend. Mikey hooks up with people on the road, but they’re people he’s never going to see again, people who don’t want anything more from him than a fuck. They don’t know him. They don’t have anything to do with this.

He takes the easier argument, says, “We’ve never done that with guys, though.” At least, he never has, and he assumes Gabe hasn’t either. He feels shitty for making the distinction, like it’s drawing some kind of moral line based on where he sticks his dick. After another few seconds of mulling that over, he says, “I don’t mean that I think it’s not cheating if it’s a girl.” He can already hear Gee’s voice rising in an impassioned speech on valuing women as more than sexual objects, and cringes a little internally.

“Hey,” Gabe says easily, his hands warm on Mikey’s sides. “Fuck them. We make our own rules, and it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks.” His mouth is warm too, warm and sweet, tasting faintly of the open bottle of orange vodka in the kitchen.

Mikey wonders if Gabe had made that offer because he knows that Mikey has been looking, or if it’s because he’s hoping for the same dispensation. He feels adrift, unsure of how to respond. They’ve been down this road once before, with Pete, but it hadn’t been the same. On some level, they’d both known that Pete was safe, that he was never going to come between them because when it came down to it, Pete couldn’t handle dick. He wanted the affection, but it was never going to go beyond hand-holding and kisses.

Mikey doesn’t know how Bill would react to either of them making an offer, but he suspects it would involve a lot more than kisses.

“Have you…?” he asks, and then trails off, not sure of how to finish it. He wants to know if Gabe has asked, or if they’ve even talked about this already, if Gabe knows something about the way Bill thinks of Mikey.

Gabe gets it without him saying anything, kissing the patch of skin behind his ear. “He got pissy this fall,” he says, a grin in his voice. “You came out to see them on tour and then you spent all your time hanging out with me.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Mikey says, which isn’t quite a rebuttal or an agreement. He doesn’t know which way he’d want to go.

“It might,” Gabe says.

The cartoon special comes back on, and Mikey falls silent, Gabe’s fingers tracing lazy patterns around his spine. It’s easier than deciding what to say.

-

Mikey goes to Chicago to visit Bob, and on a whim he ends up texting to see if Bill’s around.

Bill is, in fact, and can meet him at the train station in fifteen minutes. Mikey checks his messages, texts Gee a few random pictures of posters he sees, and when he looks up next, Bill is coming over to him and smiling.

“I thought we could get sushi, if you’re game,” Bill says. His hair is short still, which Mikey knew from seeing interview clips over the holidays but is still something new and strange.

“Sounds good to me,” Mikey says, and follows when Bill heads for the stairs.

What Bill had apparently meant by ‘get sushi’ was ‘get trashed on sake while telling stories about mutual friends’, which is honestly the most fun Mikey’s had in ages. They’re onto the fourth round when Bill rests his chin on his upturned palm, elbow on the table, tilts sideways a little and asks, “Is that Gabe’s hoodie?”

It is, as a matter of fact, although Mikey hadn’t immediately realized it after he’d left Jersey. He’s briefly stumped by how to answer that, and then again when it hits him that Bill recognizes this hoodie as Gabe’s when it’s not one he wears often.

“I just saw him in Jersey,” he says truthfully. “He lent it to me. It’s colder up here.”

Bill shivers dramatically and spears another spicy tuna roll with his chopsticks. He’s frighteningly dexterous for someone knocking back his fifth tiny cup of sake. Mikey must say that out loud, because Bill’s grin flashes, blindingly unexpected, and he says, “I have excellent hand-eye coordination.”

Mikey doesn’t let his brain run off too far with that one. They discuss bestsellers and the books they’ve been reading lately, and then Bill steals the crayon meant for the sushi orders and they go through all of the menus correcting grammar and spelling. Mikey adds doodles next to the items that don’t have pictures, fish with huge fearful eyes and an octopus wielding cutlery. It’s not Gee’s art, but there’s no one around to make the comparison.

They do a sake bomb and Bill gets so tickled by the foam that he starts giggling halfway through and almost chokes on the dregs. Mikey pounds on his back, trying not to notice the contradiction of Bill’s slender frame and the strength in his forearms when he braces them on the table and coughs with laughter.

Bill offers to let him crash and Mikey is sorely tempted, but it’s more of a temptation than he thinks he’s ready for tonight, with Bill smiling at him that way, shy and sort of soft, so he declines politely and takes himself back to Bob’s.

He thinks about texting Gabe, but Bob snorts when Mikey drags himself in and sets him up with a video game controller, so he decides to give it another hour or two. Gabe doesn’t believe in sleep; Mikey’s got all night.

-

Mikey’s in the bus lounge, enjoying the last leg of one of the best tours of his life, when Gee yells from the bunks, “Mikey, who the fuck is William Beckett?”

Mikey’s heart skips into double-time, in spite of the fact that he’s sure there’s no possible way Gee could know the things he’s been thinking lately about Bill. He pretends not to hear, just for long enough to do a speed-check of his messages (if Gabe had let something slip, Mikey would definitely have a text about it), and is reassured immediately by the updates on Gee’s Twitter, which both explain the reason for that question and suggest that Gee has no idea Mikey’s been idly fantasizing about a future even less picket-fence than his current arrangements.

“He’s in a band,” Mikey says when Gee repeats the question at a higher volume. “A friend of Pete’s.”

Frank’s already googling, his browser window full of hyperlinks and pictures. “He’s pretty,” Frank says. “He’s totally one of the guys Gabe kisses when he gets drunk at parties, isn’t he?” Mikey doesn’t have time to come up with a neutral answer before Frank finds the damning evidence and hoots, “Oh, is he ever.”

“Don’t send that to my brother,” Mikey says, before Frank gets any ideas and Gee starts hanging around looking woeful because Mikey’s boyfriend is cheating on him with jailbait emo singers in awful sweaters.

He’s about to send Gabe a warning and brief recap of his near-heart attack when his phone buzzes. It’s a text from Gabe that says only, _Bill knows_.

There’s really no need for elaboration. When Mikey asks, in a roundabout way, how this revelation came about, Gabe sends, _he kissed me. not a big deal. it’s cool._

They’re gearing up for Madison Square Garden; Mikey doesn’t really need to be thinking about this shit right now. He trusts Gabe, and he knows Bill…he’s sure that as soon as Gabe spilled that tidbit of information on his relationship status, nothing more would have happened. It’s just that he’s very far away from them, and everything feels completely out of his control. He’s not used to that being something that bothers him.

It’s too easy to visualize, as well, when he knows what they look like together, when he can see Bill’s long fingers lightly cradling Gabe’s jaw, and the tilt of their mouths together. He’s not jealous, which is slightly surprising. He just wishes he’d been there. Maybe then they wouldn’t still be in this limbo of indecision and possibility.

The Academy’s recording their new album, which according to Pete is going much better than the last one. Mikey thinks about flying out there, but he’s scheduled to be home with Gabe after they finish touring, and it’s not like there would be anything he could really do.

That doesn’t stop him from stifling a sigh against the skin of Gabe’s neck once they’re in bed together in Jersey, sweaty and temporarily sated, Mikey’s teeth setting into corded muscle. Gabe’s fingers wind through his hair, and as if reading Mikey’s mind, he says, “It’s not like you’re not enough.”

“I know,” Mikey says. He feels the same way.

Gabe rolls over on top of him, braced on his elbows. “We’ve got a whole month, just the two of us,” he says. “What do you say we make the most of it?”

Mikey doesn’t bother answering, just puts his hands on Gabe and pulls him down.

-

Pete begs, cajoles, and blackmails Mikey into judging karaoke at his club in New York, and with Gabe providing the blackmail material, it doesn’t take long until Mikey folds. Bill’s not at the event, but he shows up when they go out for a drink afterward, wrapped up in a scarf against the sharp city wind.

Mikey expects things to be different, but weirdly they aren’t at all. There’s nothing different in Bill’s expression when he says hello, no distance between them or suggestive comments about Gabe or any sign, really, that anything’s changed at all.

They have a long conversation about Bill’s frustration with people who don’t learn to properly speak their own native language and the death of modern English at the hands of chat-speak, and somehow they end up making fun of Gabe’s attempts at spelling, or rapping, or hip-hop, or whatever it is he’s doing now.

Mikey’s looking for it, so he sees when Bill catches himself, when he remembers that maybe he shouldn’t make fun of Gabe in front of Mikey like he’s just another one of their friends. And Mikey’s been waiting for the opening, so he takes another sip of his drink and asks casually, “So you’re okay with it?”

To his credit, Bill doesn’t pretend he doesn’t know what Mikey means, and he actually takes a second before answering, stirring his drink with his eyes fixed on the tinkling ice cubes. When he looks up to meet Mikey’s eyes, it’s only for a second before they drop again. “I didn’t know he was seeing someone, or I would never…I’m sorry if I made things awkward.”

“It’s not,” Mikey tells him truthfully.

Bill smiles faintly. “It’s just funny that it’s you.” He doesn’t say anything more for a while, and Mikey’s on the verge of pressing when Bill finally admits, “I had kind of a thing for you. For a while, actually.”

Mikey blinks. Gabe’s going to be so smug when he finds out about this, Mikey thinks. He’d known for ages. “Why didn’t you say anything?” he asks. It can’t be the star-struck thing; Mikey’s seen Bill hanging around rock stars like they’re his family. Fall Out Boy is huge now, and Bill still makes fun of Patrick for being awkward when they were in high school.

Bill shrugs one shoulder, oddly graceful for someone so lanky. Mikey’s never managed as much poise. “I didn’t know you might be interested, before. You only ever went home with women. And then, well.” He pauses, and Mikey can hear _Gabe_ in the silence as clearly as if he’d said it aloud. “I didn’t think I ever had a chance.”

“You didn’t,” Mikey says, being honest. By the time Bill had come along, he and Gabe had long since been together.

Bill smiles again, like a reflex, still looking at his drink. “Anyway,” he says, and finally looks up. “I’m glad. It makes sense, the two of you.”

“The two of who?” Pete asks before Mikey can respond, crashing in on the back of Matt Rubano.

“Your mom,” Bill says without missing a beat, possibly because he’s been hanging out with Pete too much. Mikey’s glad of it, anyway, and sits back while the insults fly to finish his drink.

-

After Pete goes to sleep, or at least to bed, Mikey sits on the sofa bed in Pete’s hotel suite and texts, _how do u feel about a 3some?_

Gabe’s reply comes fast even for Gabe, but Mikey isn’t even able to click on the message to read it before his phone rings.

“You mean later, right?” Gabe says. “Not tonight? Because if you have one without me, I’m going to be pissed.”

Mikey rolls his eyes and hopes Gabe can sense it. “It wouldn’t be a threesome if you weren’t there,” he points out.

“You could have found two other people, how should I know,” Gabe replies. “We are talking about who I think we’re talking about, here, right?”

“Yeah,” Mikey says, because he’s pretty sure they’re both on the same page on this one. “I don’t know. What do you think?”

“I think…wait, hang on,” Gabe says. There’s some rustling and the dull thump of a door shutting, and the background noise cuts out all at once. Gabe must have gone out somewhere. “Are you talking about a one-time thing? Or something else?”

Mikey’s been asking himself that question all night. “It’s not like we’d be able to bring him home to mom,” he says slowly.

Gabe snorts. “I wouldn’t bring anyone home to my mom anyway. We can bring him home to your mom, she’ll love him. You know she won’t care.”

Mikey gets what he’s saying, but at the same time, “It’s not exactly conventional.”

Gabe’s voice is low in his ear, with the same current of fondness in it that makes Mikey’s shoulders ease still, years down the road. “We’ve never been conventional. That’s for other people, Mikeyway, not you and me.”

Mikey rolls his neck out. He thinks about his band and Gabe’s band and how little they see each other already, without adding another tour schedule into the mix. It’s probably a bad idea, but it’s a tough one to shake.

“What do you want?” he asks finally, because that’s easier than saying any of the rest of it.

“What do I want?” Gabe echoes, smirking laughter in his tone, and Mikey drops a hand to his lap almost involuntarily at the low current of warmth generated from that voice in his ear. “More than you know. You really want to know?”

Mikey drops his head onto the back of the couch, eyes closed, letting his silence speak for him. Gabe’s voice is silk and gravel in his ear, curling around his spine and breathing hot over his cock.

“I want to watch you take him apart with your hands, those amazing fingers, watch him come all over your fist. I want him to blow you and I want to watch while he’s doing it, put my hands all over you while you pull his hair and fuck his pretty mouth.” Gabe’s breathing has gotten faster, his words rapid and low-voiced in Mikey’s ear. Mikey presses down against his dick and sees it behind his eyelids, the three of them naked together. Gabe continues, filthy-sweet and hot, “I want to fuck him, and watch him fuck you, and switch places in the morning. I want to make you come all over him and I want to lick it off. I want fucking everything.”

Mikey presses down harder until he sees light spangling behind his closed eyes. “Yeah,” he breathes.

Gabe laughs, low and warm. “What about you? What do you want?”

Mikey actually has to think about that one, but not for long. “I want to watch his face while you talk dirty to him,” he says honestly.

Gabe laughs again, a low rumbling sound that makes Mikey crack into a smile. “You’re so easy. Why the fuck are you still in New York?”

“I’ll be back tomorrow,” he promises. He’s only still here because the trains have stopped running, and because he’s still a little drunk. Besides, here he can take advantage of Pete’s gratitude for the karaoke thing to milk him for free breakfast and a tour of the best local record shops.

“I know,” Gabe says. “Try not to kiss any pretty-boy singers while you’re out there. Tell Pete hey for me.”

“Will do,” Mikey says.

There’s a noise behind him, and Mikey opens his eyes to find Pete standing behind him, squinting. “Are you having phone sex in my hotel room?” he asks.

Gabe’s laughing in his ear, the fucker, so Mikey snaps his phone shut without saying goodnight. “No,” he answers. It’s true. Sort of.

Pete’s eyebrows say he doesn’t believe it for a minute, but he must be tired, because for once he doesn’t push. “I brought you a blanket,” he says, dumping bedding on the arm of the couch. “And a spare pillow.”

“Thanks,” Mikey says. Pete disappears back into his bedroom, leaving the door cracked. He’ll probably wander out again in the middle of the night to share the sofa bed, if Mikey doesn’t end up in there. Pete’s not good at sleeping beside someone else, but he’s even worse at sleeping alone.

Mikey toes his shoes off, and his phone buzzes with a text.

 _think we could dblteam?_ Gabe’s message says.

Mikey squeezes his eyes shut tight, wills his hard-on to die down, and curls up on the couch to sleep.

-

They end up not saying anything else about it for a long time. Gabe wants them to ease into it and Mikey’s not even sure Bill’s interested, soft smiles aside, because it’s one thing to confess past crushes and another to be invited as the third wheel into a relationship. Their sex life spikes, fueled by dirty talk and fantasies, but they arrive at a mutual decision to leave it until the summer, when Gabe will be on Warped again and Mikey is officially free of band-related responsibilities for the immediate future.

It’s a liberating feeling, counting down the dates until they take a break, but he’s not even sure what he’ll do with the time. Things will change. They’ll have to, if they’re seriously thinking about bringing Bill in. Mikey thinks about all the rules they’ve made for themselves, the girls on the road and the way monogamy has never equaled commitment for them, because they haven’t needed it. He wonders if that will have to change, too, if Bill will come in with his own set of rules.

He’s getting ahead of himself, but it’s hard not to think about it, with Gabe on his own headlining tour and the sunshine growing warmer every day. He wishes there were advice columns for things like this, even if he probably wouldn’t read them and Gabe would just say _fuck it, we don’t need anyone else but us_.

Gee brings him coffee while he’s brooding, and the two of them sit at the picnic table outside the rest stop, drinking in silence behind their sunglasses.

“I know you hate me bugging you,” Gee speaks up finally, startling Mikey out of his own thoughts, “but is everything okay?”

It’s so earnest and concerned that Mikey almost smiles. Trust Gee to emerge from his bubble of self-absorption just in time to completely misinterpret. He’s like Pete in that way, caring and giving almost to a fault, when he’s not too wrapped up in himself to notice anyone else. Mikey makes a mental bet with himself on how many days it will be before Pete sends him a text.

“It’s fine,” Mikey says. Gee just waits, still projecting worry and older-brother protectiveness all over the place, so Mikey finally elaborates. “We’re just thinking about making some changes.”

He can see Gee mentally snap to attention, the pucker of his mouth proclaiming _Marriage! Babies!_

Mikey shakes his head, and this time he does smile. “Not those kinds of changes.”

Gee shuffles in place for a minute, fiddling with his sleeves and clearly planning out what he’s going to say before he puts his foot in his mouth. “I know it works for you,” he says eventually. “I just don’t get how you could be happy with someone and still want to sleep with other people.”

Mikey shrugs. He doesn’t know himself, really, except that what he does with other people is sex, and what he does with Gabe is something else entirely. It’s his life. The person he can be himself with. “No one else matters,” he says finally.

Gee scoots around to his side of the table to give him a side-hug, awkward because of the angle and the table but comfortable for all of that. He slides a plain paper envelope across the table beside Mikey’s arm. There’s no picture that Mikey can see, no doodles of unicorns or charcoal sketches of zombie brothers-in-arms, and he looks up quizzically. “What’s this?”

Gee shrugs, mouth twisting up lopsidedly. “They have a day off the same weekend we do, and it’s only a three hour flight,” he says. “I thought you might want to go home.”

The plane ticket in the envelope isn’t for Jersey, but Mikey understands the gesture. Gabe’s been ‘home’ for a while now, and this is Gee’s tangled-up way of giving his blessing.

Mikey bumps their shoulders together and tucks the ticket carefully back into the envelope. “Thanks,” he says.

Gee smiles at him, dazzling and wonky beneath his oversized sunglasses. “I’m glad you’re happy,” he says.

Mikey slides his elbow over until it nudges his brother’s, and says, “Me too.”

-

Gabe says he’s willing to do it, but Mikey thinks he ought to be the one to make the overture. Coming from Gabe, it’s too easy to take advances as harmless flirtation, or joking around. And Bill already knows Gabe’s into him, to some degree. Mikey wants him to know this is coming from both of them.

He considers heading over and asking Bill in person, but it’s Warped. There’s no privacy, and no one is ever alone enough for something like this. Over the phone could come off the wrong way, especially if there are things Bill doesn’t want to say aloud in whatever company he’s in. Bill’s a words kind of guy, Mikey reasons, they both are, which is why he ends up typing out a text, carefully considered and rephrased several times before he hits send.

 _do you want to go out to dinner with me & gabe?_ he sends.

There’s not a terribly long wait before the reply comes, which is a relief even though Mikey’s not sure what to expect. _Like a double date?_ Bill asks, and Mikey can almost see him smiling as he types it out.

Mikey pauses over the keypad, and finally sends, _more like a threeway_.

Bill’s response doesn’t come immediately. It doesn’t come for a while, actually, so Mikey adds, _date_ and sends it as a new message. There’s still no reply, but he’s fairly certain at least that there’s not much room to misinterpret.

After an hour and a half, Mikey stops pretending to care about reading his friends’ Twitter updates and gives into the impulse to call. Bill doesn’t pick up. Mikey hangs up without leaving a message and waits ten minutes before trying again. This time Bill’s phone goes straight to voicemail, so Mikey switches gears and texts Gabe.

 _think i fucked things up_ , he sends, and almost calls Gee for advice out of habit before remembering that he really doesn’t want to have that conversation now.

Gabe calls ten minutes later, when Mikey is on the verge of making up some ridiculous story to tell Gee just to hear his opinion, or – worse – calling Frank instead.

“Chill,” Gabe says. “He’s brooding. It’s what he does.”

“Did you call him?” Mikey asks. His palms are clammy. It’s not like this matters, he reasons. He and Gabe don’t need anyone else. If Bill turns them down, things will just go back to the way they’ve always been.

It’s just that now it feels like there might be a piece missing.

“He’s not talking to me either,” Gabe says. “Give him an hour to brood through a Jimmy Eat World album. He needs to listen to JEW before he’ll listen to the Jew.”

“Funny,” Mikey says.

“Relax,” Gabe says. “Trust me.”

“I do,” Mikey says. He hears Ryland’s voice in the background, warning Gabe that they’re about to be called to the stage.

“I’ve gotta go,” Gabe says. “But seriously, trust me. One hour. I’ll see you then.”

“Have a good show,” Mikey says.

“ _Te quiero,_ ” Gabe tells him.

“ _Tambien,_ ” Mikey says, and turns off his phone so he’s not waiting to hear it ring.

-

“Where are we going?” Mikey asks, stuffing his hands into his pockets to keep from poking at stuff. Gabe’s a few feet away, leaning back against the side of the Cobra bus with his ankles crossed, looking casual and unflustered. Mikey wishes he could say the same.

“Nowhere,” Gabe says. “He’s got five more minutes. After the album finishes, he has to get his shit together and make himself look pretty.”

Gabe’s voice rises at the end, and Mikey doesn’t realize why until he hears Bill behind him saying, “Fuck you.” Bill’s smiling when Mikey turns around, thumbs through his belt loops and a pale blue shirt clinging faded to his skin. He drops his arms to his sides awkwardly, catches Mikey’s eyes and says, “Hi.”

“I didn’t know if you were coming,” Mikey says. He wishes he had glasses to hide behind, suddenly, or scene hair, or his big brother. Then he hears Gabe straighten up from lounging against the bus, and it’s easier to face whatever Bill’s going to say next.

“I didn’t either,” Bill confesses, shrugging a little. He looks back and forth between them, once, before saying, “I don’t know how this works.”

“Join the club,” Gabe tells him, just off to the side. He’s not standing beside Mikey, but between them, forming the third point of a lopsided equilateral triangle. Mikey misses the support, but he can appreciate the symbolism. “We were planning on wining and dining you,” Gabe continues, flashing a familiar grin. “And seeing how that went.”

“I could agree to that,” Bill says, and the words are cautious but there’s a smile at the corners of his mouth, creeping slowly into existence. “As long as you don’t expect me to put out afterwards.”

Gabe scoffs and closes the distance, throwing an arm loosely over Bill’s shoulders. “We know how to treat a lady right. And expecting isn’t the same as hoping, right?”

Bill takes a few steps forward, pulling Gabe with him until they’re all right there, close enough to touch. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” he tells Mikey, voice calm even though he looks like Mikey feels, like he might jitter out of his skin. “But if you’re serious, then…I’m in.”

“We’re serious,” Mikey says. He can’t imagine doing this if they weren’t.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Bill says, and laughs. It makes his face light up the way it does onstage when Gabe’s next to him, or when Mikey’s shared a joke from a book the two of them have read. “Okay,” he says. “Yes. Let’s do this.”

“Yes,” Mikey says, and leans in sideways to close the circle.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic of] Congruence](https://archiveofourown.org/works/304870) by [knight_tracer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/knight_tracer/pseuds/knight_tracer)




End file.
